


Since I Saw You Last

by floatawaysomedays



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Hallucinations, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-06
Updated: 2013-08-06
Packaged: 2017-12-22 14:46:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/914455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/floatawaysomedays/pseuds/floatawaysomedays
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post 8x23</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I see you.

Dean starts seeing him again.

It happens in the grocery store. The closest one to the bunker that Dean has found yet. It’s a small place, but it’s nice enough and it’s open until midnight. Two weeks after the stars fell, and Dean is browsing the cereal aisle, full basket in hand, when he catches a glimpse of something beige turning the corner at the far end.

The basket falls to the floor, it’s contents roll and spread. Bruised apples and tomatoes mix before coming to a stop. Dean’s already long gone.

He rushes to the end cap, frantic. Holding back that one word, the name, because it’s probably just his imagination. It’s always his mind these days, playing tricks on him. Better to not get his hopes up. He slides to a stop and swings around wildly, searching, but there’s nothing. The lady at the deli, hairnet askew, is staring at him like she might call security because he’s completely lost his mind. She’s wearing bright red.

Dean thinks he probably lost it in a shower of sparks and shadows in a barn, years ago, and it’s finally catching up with him. Painfully falling down around his ears.

His heart pounds against his rib cage as he gets down on his knees against the dirty tile, and carefully, picks up the pieces.

The cashier tells him he doesn’t look so good. She calls him mister. Dean wants to tell her that she has a ghost living in the aisles, between the fruit loops  and the shredded wheat.

He doesn’t bother Sam with it when he gets back, just sets the bags on the table and checks his cell phone repeatedly, not obsessively, for the next week. 


	2. I see it in your eyes.

At first it was just glimpses.

The back of the coat mid-turn at a park made Dean stop and stare at nothing.  The top of his head, Dean would know his nest of a haircut anywhere, over a divider while he’s driving to meet Charlie. He slams on the brakes, but only manages to piss off the driver behind him in the periwinkle Honda.  Silly details, like the way his hands used to curl around his coffee, or the tap of his foot against the floor, are shoved to the front of Dean’s mind. Random moments that normally interlock to form a bigger picture are scattered in different towns, different time-zones. Dean feels like he’s remembering him in pieces, but they’re all backwards, upside down. There’s no way to stick them together and form a whole picture. It’s unnerving, but he gets past it. Sometimes he still thinks about the way Jo used to pour a shot or cock her rifle, and he’s worked through that.

Mostly.

Then it transforms into actually seeing him. All of him, all at once.

Dean turns around at a gas station and flinches violently. Suddenly he’s staring into blue eyes, and he has to take two steps back or risk taking two steps forward and discovering just how crazy he actually is. There’s a coat and black dress pants. The shoes are even scuffed just the way Dean remembers. The toes marked by use. His hands are in the pockets of the coat, but Dean imagines them twisting and turning themselves over. He remembers slight, deft fingers that never kept still.

Sam notices, immediately.  He sits bolt upright in the passenger seat and frowns. His worried voice carries through the open windows. “Dean?”

There’s about ten different versions of his name that Sam uses. This one is ‘you’re freaking me out, dude. what the hell is going on.’

Dean’s mouth opens and closes but nothing comes out, because he knows, now. Sam couldn’t see the pieces, and he can’t see the full picture. Dean wants to scream. He’s standing under the flickering light from the shitty pump, blessedly put together, finally whole, just staring. He can’t even get the name past the barrier his mind has built around it to yell at him about it being creepy. 

Dean sort of missed it, the way he used to stare. Like Dean housed the answers to the universe, and if he looked long enough he might grasp something he hadn’t been able to.

It’s been two months, and there’s been no phone call. No news. No signs.

Nothing.

Why would there be, he thinks wryly. One more miracle was one too many. What was the old saying about three strikes? Dean’s sure they’ve had more than their three chances. Purgatory should have taught him not to hope, shattered the last few semblances of whatever was left,  but it seems that it’s done quite the opposite. It’s built his hopes up to a tangible thing that has materialized.

It’s a whole new level

He jams his hands in his pockets to keep from reaching out to fix the backwards tie, and turns his back to go into the gas station. He mumbles something halfheartedly to Sam, and earns himself another worried glance.

Dean stands at the row of coffee pots and rubs his eyes. He had this litany in his head before, after the grocery store. A quiet thing on continuous repeat. But now it’s jacked itself up to a low rumble, over and over and over again.

_He’s not here. He’s not real. He’s not. He’s not here. He’s not real. He’s not._

Dean can feel eyes on his back, like someone is watching him, but it’s not the only other person in the store. The cashier is holding some gossip magazine. Dean could probably take half the store and the guy in the deep turquoise apron wouldn’t notice.

He pays and gets the hell out of there.

“You alright?” Sam asks carefully when they pull away from the curb. “Looked like you saw, well I was going to say a ghost but-”

“Nothing, it’s-” Dean shakes his head, takes a deep breath. Grips the steering wheel with both hands. Blue eyes meet green in the rear-view mirror. He works hard to keep his voice even, to keep four wheels between the lines. To not yell his name and crawl in the backseat. “I’m fine.”


End file.
